Advice needed on MC cartridges

I tried a 2M Black in my system some years ago, and it was nice but not for me. I’ve honestly liked every single MC cartridge I’ve used (some 20 now) more than it. Certainly no need to spend several K.

A new Benz Zebrawood L from the classifieds here (it ships from HK) at 1500 is a pretty great bang for buck to get that really good "lo MC" sound for not too much money. At 0.4mV output and 12 ohms ohms it’s fairly easy to match with either an active MC stage or a SUT. Its mass and compliance will work well with your VPI arm (the "dual pivot" to improve stability seems like a very good addition for their unipivots btw - I’ve personally heard good results with that and my Koetsu RSP). Hard to go wrong with that Zebrawood, and you’re not in too deep if you want to pivot elsewhere for any reason. Really pretty cartridge too!!

Mulveling, thank you much for mentioning VPI’s dual pivot mod. I’d not heard of that before and it may come in handy if I need to address Raul’s concerns about unipivots negatively affecting cartridge performance somehow.. Just read a long post on the dual pivot mod on the Steve Hoffman site and will have to look into it some more.

Appreciate your recommends too, although I think I’ll be going the expensive route. At age 70 in a few weeks, I’m beginning to realize it’s time to try and get the best you can afford while you still can and still have time to enjoy it.

Ghdprentice, that would be great to get double the usual MC life span out of a Van den Hul Frog. If I had to purchase today I’d be leaning in the Frog’s direction, but more research after identifying alternatives at that price point is probably a good idea.

If anyone has any suggestion in that $3,500 price range please let me know. Thanks,.

Mike

Unipivots are just a pain to handle-they jump all over the place whenever I’ve demoed one. I guess you can get used to it, but gimbal arms are a breeze. I’m a Rega owner for 15 years or so, and their arms IMHO give the best bang for the buck. No VTA, but I dont think that is a big deal so long as it is set up correctly initially with a spacer if needed if the cartridge is higher than Regas (I am not a big fan of their cartridges).

Unipivots are just a pain to handle-they jump all over the place whenever I’ve demoed one. I guess you can get used to it, but gimbal arms are a breeze.

This is a gross exaggeration. I owned the Graham 1.5T and then Phantom II unipivots for a total of 28yrs and found them supremely stable and easy to use - excellent sounding too. The 1.5T replaced a SME-V and was easier to setup and more adjustable. 

After 20+ years with a unipivot I agree it is not a easy to use the first dozen times you use it… I would not make an audio decision based on that.